Breaking Through
by Kiyoshi Kitana
Summary: PG; Cloud/Sephiroth. If there was a cure, which Cloud didn't think there was, he didn't want it much. Set after Advent Children.


For months after, Cloud had black, dreamless slumbers. He would wake to the chirping of tiny birds and the sunlight streaming through the blinds in his room, all parts of the world's rejuvenation. The one he helped bring about, and the one he wished he had nothing to do with. He spent his days away from everyone he knew, delivering meaningless packages from Kalm to Condor, coast to coast. It kept his mind as vacant as his heart.

For months after, Cloud was cold inside. If there was a cure, which Cloud didn't think there was, he didn't want it much. He didn't deserve to fill the emptiness he harbored within, didn't deserve to bring colour back to his dreams. He was determined to not forgive himself for what he had done not once, but twice.

Destroyed the person he worshiped; idolized; loved the most. Sephiroth.

When colour did return to Cloud's dreams, nearly a year later, it came in flashes of silver. Vibrant, almost blinding, then gone again, sending him back to the blackness. Cloud would wake, again to the tiny birds and streaming sunshine and sometimes Tifa's voice; and his eyes would burn from the brightness in his dreams.

For months, Cloud held on to the memory of the glimpses of silver, piecing together in his mind what was hard to remember. Silver, plus the softness, the silkiness of long hair. Silver, plus the sharpness of a blade. Silver buckles, breaking up the length of black leather. Cloud knew there was a time he had something with Sephiroth, something with soft mouths and warm hands, but Cloud can't remember much beyond saving the world, killing some part of himself in the process.

Later, other colours trickle back into Cloud's dreams. Sometimes in the form of the glowing orange flames of Nibelheim's destruction, backed by snowy mountains; sometimes in the form of the flickering dark green of mako powered lights under the Midgar plates. Through it all, though Sephiroth's form takes no shape that he can see, Cloud can feel himself being guided through the images. Through his own memories.

Each night that Cloud walks, he finds himself closer to something. He can feel the tug of it in his chest, like a puppet pulled by its heartstrings. When he is awake, Cloud finds himself searching the scenery during his deliveries, hoping to find a clue that will tie his dreams to the waking world. For months still, he finds nothing. The scenery, though familiar, means nothing to him. The world he saved means so little, even when he tries to care. It's hard, especially with no strong hand to steer him.

One night, two years now after the events in Edge, Sephiroth's form shimmers into life in the swirling mass of colours that are Cloud's dreams. Cloud's wandering comes to a stop; standing out from the reds, browns, oranges, and purples, is the black and silver that he longed to be familiar with again. Sephiroth's green eyes are piercing, cutting through him more than ever. His lips move, but no sound comes out. Cloud's answering voice is loud in his ears.

Then again, unsatisfied, he wakes to the buzzing of bees and the smell of eggs. It starts off as once a week that Sephiroth comes to him, speaking wordlessly. It edges into two nights, then three; before long, Sephiroth is with Cloud every night. It originally pained him to do so, but eventually Cloud stops trying to understand what Sephiroth is trying to say. He contents himself to watch the curve of Sephiroth's lips, drowning under the weight of the gaze that pins him. Sometimes, Cloud wakes up shivering. Not from the chill of the night, but from the damp heat of sweat drying on his skin. Cloud eagerly awaits the night, now. The emptiness that once held Cloud close to its bosom has dissipated. In its place are desire, hope, fear, and dread – all warring for control over him.

It isn't until Yuffie came to visit that Cloud realizes that he's completely withdrawn from life as he knew it. He never let go of the things he needed to do, but his mind is always elsewhere. Methodically and mechanically, Cloud sees how he's been living: stumbling through life, sustaining on a daily diet of Sephiroth. With a side of Tifa's cooking, of course. There is a voice in the back of Cloud's head that day, telling him he need not go any further. The search is over.

The night after Yuffie's visit, Cloud dreams of Sephiroth once more. It is in his dream, then, that he knows what the voice has been telling him. That he understands. He will never touch, taste, or smell Sephiroth again. That much is certain. That much pains him to admit, even now, three years later. But Sephiroth is in Cloud, a presence embedded so deep that he can never carve out; and now that Cloud knows that Sephiroth is with him, in dreams and in waking, tangible even in spirit, he somehow feels at ease. He can look up and appreciate the blues, whites, and yellows of the sky now, and not regret that they exist when what he wants does not.

For months, Cloud thought that when Sephiroth died, he did too. Thought that Sephiroth took with him everything it ever meant to be human, wanted, and cherished. For years, Cloud searched to find that missing piece of his self, despairing when it seemed it could not be replaced. Yet today when Cloud wakes up, blinking through the filtered light that creeps through his window, he feels whole again. It's a feeling he almost doesn't recognize, it's been so long since he's felt it.

The knowledge echoes through him as he dresses, eats his breakfast, and sets out on his bike for the day. Sephiroth is _in him_, and can never really go away. The burdens on his shoulders lessen by the hour.

Cloud comes back by nightfall, tumbling sleepily into bed. Only the ghostly feel of a hand on his shoulder remains.


End file.
